Out in Pflugerville, a suburb of Austin, Texas, a middle school teacher recently lost his job because he openly shared his racist views with students.
In a viral video, the former Bohls Middle School teacher, whose name has not been released, told students that he’s “ethnocentric,” which means he believes his race is “the superior race.” He went on to add he believes “everybody thinks that, they’re just not honest about it.”
A video like this recorded by students is likely to go viral all on its own, but this teacher particularly goofed because one of the students in the class is the son of producer Southside, of 808 Mafia. Thanks to the viral video, this teacher was put on administrative leave over the weekend, and you know what that means for anybody that isn’t a cop: You about to lose yo’ job. According to ABC News, he is "no longer employed."
As someone who went to middle and high school just 60 miles north of where all this went down, I can assure you there are a lot of teachers in Texas who think just like this man. (Many other former students could likely attest to that sad reality.) During my public school days—before we all stayed strapped with recording devices on our person—the coolest phone you could have was a Razr; the iPhone didn’t touch down ’til I hit 12th grade. Those former educators of mine should be thankful for this and a very Draconian campus cell phone policy, because I know there are a couple who would’ve been dumb enough to get caught slipping. As for the newly unemployed teacher at Bohls Middle School, I’m less surprised he said what he said and more shocked he said it on camera.
There’s a lot of talk about how teachers don’t get paid enough, which is true; they don’t. It’s a direct reflection of America’s values—public school teachers in Texas earned an average salary of $57,090 in 2020. However, knowing teachers have an exorbitant amount of influence in shaping children’s perspectives, we need to talk about their inherent racial biases just as much as we talk about their paychecks.
H. Drew Blackburn